Hanscom Air Force Base

A Small Base With a Big Shadow

Hanscom Air Force Base, located on 846 acres at the intersection of Lexington, Concord, Bedford and Lincoln, is an unusual Air Force Base in that it has no aircraft – but it does have a critical mission and a substantial economic impact on Massachusetts and the North Suburban Region. The 9th largest business employer in Massachusetts, Hanscom AFB expends over $589M in total annual payroll to almost 5,500 direct employees, 14,500 indirect jobs, and $8.4 billion total economic activity.

Hanscom’s military, civilian and contractor personnel carry out the vital mission of providing the latest in command and control and cyber systems to the Air Force, the Department of Defense and our allies. These systems gather and analyze information on potentially hostile forces, enabling commanders to make quick decisions and rapidly communicate them. they also protect and defend the AF across the cyber domain. To conduct this level of business requires close to $5.6 B in annual contract expenditures by the men and women working for Hanscom AFB.

Hanscom personnel determine the operational user’s needs, define systems to best meet those needs, ask for proposals from industry, select contractors and monitor their progress. Teams of professionals specializing in engineering, science, business, acquisition and information technology supervise the design, development, testing, production and deployment of command and control and cyber systems.

Hanscom currently manages hundreds of programs with an annual budget of more than $3 billion. Many of the systems developed and acquired at Hanscom represent America’s most valuable defense assets, such as the E-3 AWACS, the E-8 Joint STARS and Air Operations Centers, which control air power across the globe.

It is no accident that Hanscom AFB benefits from close proximity to the world’s leading technology and innovation academic, business, and public-private assets. These national resources are closely connected to, and substantially enhanced, Hanscom’s vital national security mission.